1. In 2001, as part of the Navy's transformation, a Naval Review was carried out. This very important process focussed on the following:

The Navy's core business is to prepare and support naval forces to fight at sea. The Navy is funded and mandated to carry out this task only.

2. The Navy is NOT funded, NOR is it mandated, to carry out any of the following tasks:

1. Port security (National Port Authority).
2. Maritime traffic control (Dept of Transport).
3. Search and rescue at sea (Dept of Transport).
4. Law enforcement at sea and in harbours (SAPS).
5. Fishery protection (Dept of Environment Affairs and Tourism).
6. Pollution control at Sea (Dept of Environment Affairs and Tourism).

3. Although the Navy does not budget, structure or train for the abovementioned tasks, the Defence Act allows the Minister of Defence to order the Navy to provide naval assets to support any of the departments mentioned.
4. Over and above its core business, the Navy is to add value to the Government's RDP programme as well as to NEPAD. These are not funded activities, but are to be derived from the way the Navy does its business.

5. The aim of this paper is to inform the Defence Oversight Committees of the background against which the transformation of the Naval Reserve (NR) is structured under Project PHOENIX.

6. Purpose of the Naval Reserve. The NR exists to
1. augment the Navy in a state of national defence or in a state of emergency when defence reserves can be mobilised; and

1. support the Navy in time of peace through periods of voluntary continuous service.

7. Focus of the Naval Reserve. The NR is designed to focus on the combat capability of the Navy. They have no other focus or any other reason to exist.
8. Vision of the New Naval Reserve. The new NR will have the following characteristics:

1. They will be inclusive, ie will fully reflect the RSA’s demographics and will not be restricted to any geographic area.
2. They will have the ability to augment the Navy in time of war (less than 1% of the time, wars are infrequent and mobilisation for war should not happen more than once per century).
3. They will have the ability to support the Navy in time of peace (more than 99% of the time).
4. They are to add the Navy’s RDP commitment.
5. They are to add to the Navy’s efficiency, economy and effectiveness.
6. They must be administered as an integral part of the Navy.

8. Opportunities to be exploited. The following opportunities exist in the 21^st century that can be exploited to make the new NR a success:

1. The internet, e-mail and mobile phone technology make for easy communication to and from for administrative purposes.
2. Central control equals distributed control, ie the NR can be administered either centrally or in a distributed manner (ie from various locations), or both. The administrative model is very flexible.
3. The DOD’s HR Strategy 2010 provides unique opportunities to prepare and feed people into the NR. Any member of the Navy who elects to leave the Navy must serve at least five years in the NR. This will be an "up front" requirement in any service contract in the future.
4. Navy recruits are all fed through the "Military Skills Development" (MSD} phase of training at the Naval Gymnasium at SAS SALDANHA. On completion of this training all sailors will have the skills to serve in a warship as a "platform operator", ie a sailor who is qualified to serve at sea in a non-combat system post (to serve as a combat operator certain special training is specified).
5. During the MSD phase of training, all sailors will be given extensive developmental training aimed at "nation building", ie to prepare them also to become responsible citizens of the RSA. This training will include the following specific aspects:

1. Military discipline, bearing and leadership.
2. Basic seamanship.
3. Small arms handling.
4. Swimming.
5. Fire fighting and damage control.
6. Maritime first aid.
7. Basic communications skills.
8. Computer literacy.
9. Life skills and citizenship.
10. General ship knowledge.
11. Environmental training.

1. The existence of volunteer organisations at municipal level where these skills can add value and be further sharpened. Such volunteer organisations are, inter alia, the SAPS Reserve, St John’s Ambulance, the National Sea Rescue Institute (NSRI), the Parks Board, volunteer fire brigade, civil defence and youth development organisations, to name a few. NR members will be encouraged to join these organisations.

9. The Navy’s vision for the Naval Reserve. The new NR could consist of the following three divisions (the names have been chosen to represent the main parts of a warship):

1. Quarter-deck Division. All NR officers will be grouped in this division and will be developed to both augment and support the Navy.
2. Main-top Division. Sailors who have elected to resign from the Core Career System and who are trained as combat operators will be grouped in this division. These sailors are able to both augment the Navy, but also to support the Navy in time of peace. They can be employed without any further training and have the right to advance their status in the Naval Reserve if they so wish on a voluntary basis (ie they can volunteer for further training).
3. Fore-castle Division. Sailors who have completed the MSD phase of training only and have not qualified as combat system operators will be grouped in this division. These sailors can augment the Navy in time of war, but would then require further training to become combat operators.

10. The Dormant Naval Reserve All members whose voluntary contracts expire will, if their contracts are not renewed, have their names listed in the Dormant Naval Reserve. Members have the right to volunteer for further service from within the Dormant NR and on the conclusion of a new service contract they can than be moved to either the Main-top or Quarter-deck Divisions.

11. Fore-castle Division. It is foreseen that members of this division will ONLY be required to serve in a state of national defence or in state of emergency when they are mobilised for this purpose. Voluntary service can, however, be entertained

1. if the member wishes to qualify himself or herself as a combat operator (ie to be promoted from Fore-castle to Maintop Division) or as an officer in the NR; or
2. if a member volunteers for such service for a specific period of time (aimed at particularly seasonal workers who may require employment between jobs).

A member in Fore-castle Division will be requested to deliver volunteer service in his community during the five-year period of his reserve contract. The organisations listed in par 8.f are examples of such volunteer service. Such a member will not have his or her five-year NR service contract renewed after expiry and will then be listed on the Dormant Naval Reserve.

12. What is wrong with the current Naval Reserve? This question is regularly asked and is answered in the following paragraphs:

1. The current NR is extremely exclusive. Because it revolves around the existence of the seven reserve units (Cape Town, Pretoria, Johannesburg, Durban, East London, Port Elizabeth and Simon’s Town), members not living in their vicinity are excluded from belonging to the reserve. A person living for instance in Kokstad, Upington and Umtata is therefore denied the opportunity to serve in the NR.
2. Because of the history of the NR the units are still mainly white in their composition.
3. The requirement to attend regular parades at the reserve units denies a person the opportunity to get involved in community projects and organisations.
4. The reserve units are administrative groupings and cannot be operational deployed, nor can they provide training for the core-business of the Navy.
5. Cost of maintaining these units and safeguarding the facilities and assets actually detract from releasing funds for career development.
6. The reserve units are "heavy on non-core man-days". Their administrative requirements expend NR man-days on other than force preparation tasks.
7. The current NR members are the results of a previous era and are not good role models for the new NR.

13. Implementation. The new NR system is currently being developed under an administrative instruction from Chief of the Navy, with the guide lines based upon the above system. The leader in the transformation design phase is Director Naval Reserves, Rear Admiral (Junior Grade) Ernst Pentzhorn. The development is nearly complete and will be submitted to the Navy Board for decision in November 2003. The implementation of the new Naval Reserve system will be done under Project PHOENIX. Certain elements of the implementation plan are already identified, and the decommissioning of all Naval Reserve Units by the end of FY 2007 is one of the elements. The re-establishment of the Naval Gymnasium at SAS SALDANHA commenced on 1 January 2003 with the introduction of the first MSD phase in the Navy.

CONCLUSION

14. The design of the New Naval Reserve is based on the requirement that the NR becomes an integral part of the Navy and that the NR is to support the core business of the Navy. As such the current Naval Reserve Units will be decommissioned and posts for NR members will be established on the post establishments of all Force Structure Elements of the Navy. The implementation of Proj PHOENIX has already commenced, but will speed up once the final design has been approved by the Navy Board.

(J.F. RETIEF)